


Hello, I Must Be Going

by rm (arem)



Series: Too Soon and Always [21]
Category: Glee
Genre: Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-08
Updated: 2012-10-08
Packaged: 2017-11-15 20:57:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/531612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arem/pseuds/rm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Preparing to leave.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hello, I Must Be Going

**Author's Note:**

> While there is nothing in this chapter that falls under the categories of things we always warn for in fandom, this chapter is filled with bad communication around sex, relationships and fidelity. It was unpleasant to write and may be unpleasant to read.

He hasn't received the contract yet, but Kurt knows he leaves in three weeks, and so he's already begged Blaine for just one day where they don't tell anyone anything.

He has 47 missed calls on his mobile, and he's not ready to face any of them.

“Do you want me to stay home today?” Blaine asks in the dim morning, hours before his alarm. They've barely slept.

Kurt shakes his head.

“No. No, you should go in and enjoy this,” he says, skimming his fingers up Blaine's arm.

“I know, but --”

Kurt shrugs. “Timing,” he says and rolls onto his back, not grateful, particularly, that everything always happens at the same time.

“Don't pull away.” Blaine's voice is sharp, and maybe that's neurotic, but Kurt is leaving for a year and so maybe it should be.

“Sorry.” Kurt rolls back to him, but his body remains brittle.

“I get the impulse,” he says trying to soothe. “I do. God, I do. But don't. You need your day of not telling anyone, and I need my three weeks of having you.”

“I don't know how we're going to do this,” Kurt says.

*

Blaine's not surprised when Burt, congratulatory about the court decision and worried at Kurt's silence, calls his mobile first thing in the morning instead.

Blaine would laugh, but it's awkward, and he's exhausted and trying to cram a piece of toast into his mouth before he has to leave for school. Kurt's still abed, and if Blaine has any say in it, will stay there for most the day, but he knows it's not possible. Kurt will call when he receives the contract, and they'll meet for lunch so Blaine can be there when he signs it.

He shakes himself when realizes Burt has finished talking and sort of expects an answer to something Blaine didn't quite hear.

“Oh, yeah, no, he's fine, there's just a lot going on,” he stumbles. “It was a long night --”

“I bet it was,” Burt says in that tone he uses whenever he wants to give his kids grief about their adult lives.

Blaine sighs. Any other day but today; his temptation is to snap and say that they spent the whole night crying, not fucking, but somehow he reigns it in.

“Look, Burt, you know I love you, and completely respect your right to needle Kurt and I about pretty much everything, but yesterday was wonderful and really, really hard, so I kind of don't have it in me to do the affable chagrin game with you right now.”

“What's going on?”

“It brought up some stuff,” Blaine says, hedging.

“You propose?” Kurt's dad asks into the silence.

“I'm not allowed 'til I graduate,” he says, realizing he's a lot less sanguine about it than he's been in a while.

“Bet that's driving you nuts.”

“More than you know.”

Burt chuckles. “Well, you don't need my permission, but you've got it if you want it.”

“Thanks,” Blaine says softly. “I appreciate that. I'd ask, when the time comes, but he wouldn't like it.”

“He's not a girl,” Burt says.

“Nope, that he's not.”

“Is that my dad?” Kurt calls from the bedroom.

“Yeah,” Blaine hollers back.

“Let me talk to him!”

*

Kurt is still curled up in a news of blankets when Blaine passes him the phone and sits down beside him.

“Daddy,” Kurt breathes.

“Oh, now I know something's up,” Burt groans.

“I got a tour,” Kurt says in a small voice, and so much for just one normal day, Blaine thinks.

“I'm gonna need more than that, Kurt. Like Rachel got a tour or....”

“No. Not like Rachel,” he says, voice still small, and he's almost disappointed in himself for not sounding more smug. He takes a deep breath. “It's a first national tour, like Broadway, just not on Broadway.”

“Shit. Kiddo, that's amazing.”

“I haven't told anyone else yet. So please don't. I just... we just... we need some time.”

His father sobers. “How long is this taking you away for?”

“A year,” Kurt says, timidly.

“Hell.”

“Yeah. We just... we'll figure it out.”

*

When Blaine gets to class, Kate pulls him into a fierce hug.

“I'm so happy for you,” she whispers, and she's one of the few that day not to talk to him about implementation process or ask when he's going to propose and for that he's grateful, even if it makes him feel worse for lying.

He says his quiet is a hangover and that he's taking off for lunch so that he and Kurt can have a quickie.

*

When Blaine gets to the copy shop, Kurt has already printed out the contract and is fanning himself with it as he leans against a counter covered with pens and glue sticks.

“Everything in order?” Blaine asks in a rush.

Kurt kisses him hard by way of answer, and, while they are sometimes affectionate in public, usually it's not like this, not in a shop window in the middle of the day.

“Yeah,” he says, pulling back.

Blaine smiles.

“You ready for this?” Kurt asks.

“Are you?” Blaine counters.

He bites back on a flip answer and then gives Blaine a gentle smile. “Secret?”

“Yeah?”

“I think I always have been.”

Blaine beams. “Sign it then.”

“Last chance to say no,” Kurt says, pen hovering over the paper.

Blaine shakes his head and leans into Kurt's space, murmuring yes, yes, and yes in his ear, so that Kurt scrawls his name laughing, before settling himself into Blaine's arms.

*

They go through their copious missed calls and unanswered messages sitting across from each other at their kitchen table picking at cartons of Chinese food.

“I think this is the worst cashew chicken I've ever eaten,” Blaine says with his mouth full.

“So,” Kurt says, ignoring his bad manners, “I suppose I have to do my family, Alex, Henry, Seanna and Rachel.”

“You want to pawn the rest off on me?”

“Sort of desperately, yeah. Can I do that?”

“It's a good thing I like you,” Blaine says, shoving the carton away, as he gets up to kiss the top of Kurt's head.

“You starting with Wes?” he asks, as Blaine moves to what passes as his office.

“Yeah,” he says. “That okay?”

“That's perfect. Let him know he'll be hearing from me about your care and feeding while I'm gone.”

“He's gonna love that.”

Kurt shrugs. “One of a long list, Blaine.”

*

The calls are excruciating, and by the time he gets to Rachel he's too tired to even care that he's comforting her and she's asking him what he's going to do about Blaine, as if he's an inconvenient pet.

“Okay, that was awful,” he says, after he gets off the phone with her and Blaine is finishing up with Tina.

“Everyone's really happy for you,” Blaine says when he finally hangs up.

“Are they giving you their condolences?”

“Yeah, kind of.”

“I fucking hate this.”

“It's not unexpected.”

For a moment, Kurt considers letting it go, or at least being comforting. Instead, he blurts, “I want to do all the terrible stuff now.”

Blaine nods; it's perfectly reasonable, but when he says “Fine,” it comes out defensive.

“We're not breaking up,” Kurt declares as if Blaine might somehow disagree.

“No. Of course not. Who suggested that?”

“No one. Not in so many words,” Kurt says sullenly.

Rachel, Blaine thinks just a little viciously.

“And I can't take you with me.”

“You wouldn't, even if you could.”

“No.” Kurt's voice is soft and small, and Blaine knows he already feels bad for how much of this he's going to need to do alone.

“And you won't let me propose,” he says just to double check.

“Not in a panic. Not like this.”

“I would be a lot happier if you left with my ring on your finger.”

“Your ring is on my finger,” Kurt points out, waggling his hand at him.

Blaine rolls his eyes. “You know what I mean.”

“What if I promise not to make up a wife this time?”

Blaine snorts; it's all so funny and awful. “Look, do you want,” he starts, stops, takes a deep breath and tries again. “Do you want to open this up?”

“Do you?” Kurt asks incredulously.

“Not what I asked.”

“Stupid.”

“What is?”

“You, thinking I don't know how to starve,” he says.

There had been years he was sure his life would never hold anything more intimate than girls who deigned to let him play with their hair, and it doesn't matter that he was a child then, it felt, and still feels, extraordinarily real.

“I'm not the one who went to Shanghai either,” Kurt continues.

“I feel like an asshole.”

“Do you want... would you even enjoy...?” Kurt tries to ask.

“I don't think so?” Blaine says, uncertain. “I just want to know we're not going to fall apart when I fuck this up.”

“How about, you not fuck this up?” Kurt snaps. “I know you think you're the grown up around here with the grad school and the helping humanity, but you are playing the odds and banking on other people's approval just as much as me, if not more; and god, if you'd had an actual affair it would have been a lot less annoying than you using me and what's-his-name --”

“Thomas –”

“Thomas – to punish yourself.”

“What do you want me to do, Kurt?”

“I DON'T KNOW! You keep asking me what I want, Blaine, when I just got the only thing I have ever wanted other than you. What do you want? I'm leaving for a year! The ball's kind of in your court.”

*

The sex they have that night is aggressive and not mutually so. Kurt is surprised his body, and for that matter, his heart, allows it.

*

“I want to marry you,” Blaine says, after, still inside him and breathing raggedly.

Kurt snorts. It's ridiculous. “You will; I will.”

“Then let me propose,” Blains groans, finally pulling out and rolling to the side.

Kurt doesn't move beyond making a vague hand gesture in his boyfriend's general direction; he's sore, annoyed and boneless and just wants some damn sleep.

“The day you graduate Blaine. For all I care, you can call me from a fucking payphone while I'm in line at airport security, and I'll say yes.”

He doesn't think they've ever been less romantic.

*

“No nudity, no fluids, no repeat performances, and never, ever in private,” Kurt says with no preamble when Blaine wakes up the next morning.

“What does that even mean?” he asks, chagrined at the possibility that Kurt's been up all night thinking about this.

“That if you make out with some guy on some dance floor until you come in your pants, I don't care. But I don't want to know; I'm not encouraging you; and I will not be doing the same.”

“Kurt --”

“No, Blaine. You're going to tell me you won't or you won't want to, and that's all probably true, but if you say that and then you go and do it anyway, we're going to wind up having words about it while I'm on the road, and I just can't.”

Blaine sighs; it's too early for this. “What do you actually want?”

Kurt rolls onto his back and stares at the ceiling, crossing his arms belligerently over his chest.

“To picture you in winter, all gloves and turtlenecks trying to remember the last time anyone touched you even casually, as you watch the fingers of the woman in front of you at the supermarket brush the cashier's hand as she receives her change.”

His voice is younger than Blaine has heard it in years.

“I want you pulled out of the world of other people with me,” Kurt adds when Blaine says nothing.

“Okay.”

“What?”

“I can't do a year of pretending everything is normal when it's not. But I can do a year of strange rules, so I'd rather they be ones that don't make you miserable.”

*

Kurt signs up for as many shifts at the bars he can in the time left to him before he stops working, happy to sing catty songs to bachelorette parties and deftly twist his hips out of the way of handsy drunks.

Without having had this place, he wouldn't be leaving it.

He takes to heading in early and calling the crate on which he had a panic attack less than a week ago his office as he phones friends to chat both blithe and strange. It's a respite from the melancholy and intense lack of privacy Blaine's current need to be close and closer affords him.

*

Sometimes, Henry joins him, leaning on the bar next to his crate and chatting with whoever's working. Kurt appreciates that his presence is the same as it's ever been, without fear and expectation. It makes him miss curling up with Alex, and he calls her often.

*

“No, listen to the woman who used to be married,” Alex says because Kurt is flailing despite having called under the auspices of wanting advice. “You two have never had rules. You've had assumptions, which worked because you were children playing house. But now you're not children, and you're not going to be playing house for a while, so you can't blame him for wanting a framework.”

“But why do things have to change?” Kurt whines.

“Because they're changing. And because it sounds like Blaine can only imagine rules as something different than you have now.”

“Oh.”

“Yes, oh.”

“How can you be so good at this and still be perpetually single?”

“Because I'm lazy. I'd much rather you two do the work.”

“You're very weird.”

“I miss you and all your flowers, you know.”

“Almond pastries,” he says, unwilling to get emotional about people he's not going to be any farther away from.

“I could overnight you some,” she offers.

Kurt is tempted, but it wouldn't be the same.

*

“I've decided to limit myself to one suitcase,” Kurt says, throwing open the doors of his closet; it's time to plan. “You can bring me anything I decide I need later, and I guess take stuff back for me so I don't wind up with a fleet of bags by the end. Plus, I think it would freak you out if I actually emptied the closet.”

“More than you can imagine.”

Kurt turns and leans against his wardrobe with his hands behind him. “You know this isn't me moving out, right?”

“You're just going on a very long vacation,” Blaine says, trying for wry but sounding more than a bit morose.

“And I'll be back in December, for three weeks, so be grateful for that stand.”

“Believe me, I am. Best present imaginable.”

“Good,” Kurt says and turns back to his clothes. “I figure as long as I'm east of Chicago, you can probably come visit like once a month?”

“I was thinking more?”

“You were thinking crazy. You've a life here Blaine. And I need you to keep it up for both of us.”

“We'll see how it goes.”

“Yes,” Kurt says, not wanting the argument, “that we will.”

“It'll be harder when you're out West.”

“Yeah. And before you even suggest it, you are not bagging your summer work plans to follow me around. I need you to do whatever you need to do to get us to New York, okay?”

“What, by the way, are we going to do about that?”

“What do you mean?”

“I really don't want to be looking at apartments without you. Boston was one thing, but....”

“Oh,” Kurt says, pausing. “I hadn't thought of that.”

“And I don't want to pack this place up without you. I mean, it would be --”

“Like I was moving out now. Yeah,” he says thoughtfully. “Well, shit.”

“I suppose we can talk about it at Christmas?” Blaine asks, knowing that maybe he just has to let something go right now.

*

“No,” he says firmly.

“But --”

“No, Seanna. I do not want a going away party. I am already dealing with Blaine's elaborately funereal moods, and I just can't.”

“Is he driving you crazy?”

Kurt throws her a vicious look.

“Is it okay?” she asks.

“Yes... No.... I don't know. Everything he needs to cope with this is exactly the opposite of what I need. He wants to drive me up to New York two days early so I can settle in --”

“What are you doing with that?”

“Oh, just borrowing his ex's studio for three weeks,” knowing he sounds bitter in an incredibly misleading way.

“I thought there wasn’t an ex.”

“There's not. Not really. Guy we went to high school with. Straight. Bad complicated thing. Super close friend. Buckets of too much information. Anyway, I want to stay home as long as possible and take the bus up in the middle of the night one last time for old times sake. But then Blaine wants to come up every weekend while we're doing rehearsals and I'm just like, no, I'm going to be on the road for a year, and I can't start that year and make it through by tearing myself apart with saying goodbye to him every three seconds.”

“You tell him all of this?”

“You ever try telling Blaine something when he's feeling vulnerable?”

“He's your boyfriend. What happens?”

“He does something lovely and then I cry.”

*

In the afternoon of Kurt's last shift at the bar, Blaine finally calls his parents. His mother answers the phone, and he hates that; he doesn't know how to be small for her from so far away.

“I have something to tell you,” he says right away so that he doesn't avoid saying it at all. He feels terrible then as her breath tightens.

“Did you --”

“No, no,” he says laughing. “Not that, not yet. I... Kurt got a part.”

“Then why do you sound the opposite of good?”

“It's a tour, and he's going away for a year.”

“Baby.”

“It's fine. We've always agreed... he's given up so much for me. But he leaves in five days, and it's really hard.”

She makes a sympathetic noise, and for a long time they just sit on the phone, listening.

“I know he taught you to breathe,” hie mother says eventually. “I saw that happen. But don't ever mistake that for needing him to breathe, okay?”

Blaine nods, says, “Yeah,” and hopes he doesn't sound too choked. “Will you tell dad?” he asks. “I don't think I'm up to it right now.”

*

Kurt's already at the bar when Blaine gets there with a kiss and a tight squeeze of his waist.

“You ready for this?” he asks.

“Never more,” Kurt says, both cheery and grim. It's one thing to make an entrance; it's another to make an exit.

*

“So I have some news,” Kurt says, when he goes up to the mic for his last set of songs for the night.

“Show us the ring!” someone hollers from the audience.

“God. What is with you people and your obsession? It's not that type of news,” Kurt snaps. “But all of you need to indulge me for a moment anyway. I'm leaving,” he says, and flaps his hands at the audience to be quiet when they voice their disappointment. “Because I got a tour. A big, old fashioned, first national fucking tour.”

Blaine laughs. Kurt never curses in public quite like that.

“So you don't get to be sad for me,” he continues, sobering. “But you do get to be sad for Blaine, because I'm going to be gone for a year, and I want you all to take care of him, okay?”

At their table in the back, shared with Kate and Henry, Seanna and George, Blaine just hides his face in his hands.

“He's blushing now,” Kurt says, pointing, as the pianist starts in on the opening chords of “The Jeweler.”

“He didn't warn you at all, did he?” Henry murmurs.

Blaine shakes his head and doesn't look up.

“And now I'm about to make it worse,” Kurt adds, feeling a bit shy himself. “Anyway, Blaine doesn't really believe in god, and I really don't, but... well, this is what I came up with.”

*

After Blaine has struggled to hide his tears by seeking refuge in the bar's bathroom – and wow, he's never been an actual sad drunk before – Kurt drives them home.

*

In the morning, he's woken by Blaine's jaw, rough with stubble rubbing against his thigh.

“Is this an apology?” he chuckles, sleepily.

Blaine hums, the sound noncommittal.

Kurt is relieved when he gets a blow job instead of a real answer; he's not yet quite up to another round of domestic dread.

*

After, when Kurt tries to pull him up for a kiss, he discovers that Blaine is stubbornly content where he is and not even particularly interested in getting off, so he just cards his fingers through Blaine's hair instead.

“You know how we tried to get all the awful stuff done at once and pretty much got nothing done and then just yelled at each other instead?” Blaine asks after a while.

“Mmmmmhmmmm.”

“I'm sorry.”

“I know.”

“This is... it's very easy for me to forget this is hard for you too. Maybe harder.”

“No, probably not harder,” Kurt says.

Blaine tilts his head up awkwardly to look at him. “I'd be completely terrified,” he says.

“Well, good thing it's not you then.”

Blaine smiles and settles his head back down on Kurt's stomach.

“Would it be stating the obvious to say I have some issues with abandonment?” he asks after a while.

“Probably,” Kurt sighs. “But, I'm not as good at remembering that as I should be.”

“I don't see how.”

Kurt snorts. “Oh, Blaine. I'm friends with Rachel for a reason. You've always had me, I think, but I forget sometimes that doesn't make up for everything else.”

Blaine nods against Kurt's flesh. “I hate that I can't lay it all at your feet,” he murmurs.

“I know.”

*

That afternoon, for the first time since he's signed the contract, Blaine really listens to what Kurt needs, and they call Wes and tell him Kurt won't be up until Monday morning; they'll have to do the key hand-off after Kurt's first day of rehearsals.

Because this is not Kurt moving to New York.

This is Kurt, taking the 2am bus up to New York for work.

It'll be fine, until it isn't, and then it'll be fine again, because that's a choice they can actually make.

*

“Is that 'Shuffle off to Buffalo'?” Blaine asks, amused, as Kurt hums to himself while fixing them lunch after their chat with Wes.

“I can't believe we're opening in Schenectady,” is all Kurt says by way of reply.

*

“Do you have everything?” Blaine asks again.

“You'll be up in five days. Whatever it is, I can live without it,” Kurt says, trying not to look at the manila envelope Blaine shoves at him filled with legal documents about emergency contacts and health care proxies and a ton of shit that no state is going to recognize because they're so not married.

But this is, Kurt knows, Blaine's way of pretending they are, and so he shoves the envelope into his bag without comment.

*

They spend the rest of the evening trying to doze on the couch, Kurt tangled in Blaine's arms. When the alarm on his phone goes off, Blaine works hard not to tense or twitch a single muscle.

“If you need me not to go, say the word,” Kurt says softly after a while.

Blaine kisses the top of Kurt's head and pushes them up to sitting. He's grateful for the offer, so terrible and sincere.

*

“Why does this feel awkward?” Kurt asks, as they idle in the parking lot staring at the bus. “This never feels awkward.”

“Yeah, well.”

“Why is your not blowing me in a bus station parking lot suddenly the most romantic thing you've done in ages?” Kurt asks, an edge of hysteria clear in his voice.

Blaine starts laughing and can't stop; Kurt grins and joins in.

“Those were good times,” Blaine teases.

“They were. And we're going to have great times this year, just... everywhere.”

Blaine grabs Kurt's hand and squeezes. “I know. I should let you go.”

Kurt takes a deep breath, nods as he straightens his posture and reaches for the door, but then he pauses, turning coy and looking back at Blaine over his shoulder.

“Would you carry my bag?” he asks with a smile.

His voice is breathy, unsure, and very knowing.

**Author's Note:**

> "The Jeweler" refers to the This Mortal Coil version of the song, although in Kurt's register. "Shuffle Off to Buffalo" is from 42nd Street.


End file.
